Obama team to review clemency process

Apr. 16, 2014
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White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler. / Charles Dharapak, AP

by David Jackson, USA TODAY

by David Jackson, USA TODAY

President Obama, who has been reticent about using his pardon and clemency powers, is reviewing the process of granting them.

White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler said Tuesday that Obama has asked the Justice Department to improve the clemency process and solicit more applications for commutations and pardons.

"The president believes that one important purpose can be to help correct the effects of outdated and overly harsh sentences that Congress and the American people have since recognized are no longer in the best interests of justice," Ruemmler said in a speech at New York University's law school.

She added: "This effort also reflects the reality that our overburdened federal prison population includes many low-level, nonviolent offenders without significant criminal histories."

Ruemmler spoke the same day that Obama shortened the prison term of a man who was sentenced to an extra three-and-a-half years behind bars because of a typographical error.

"Obama commuted only one sentence in his first term, causing critics to charge that he was being too stingy with his power. Last December, Obama cut time for eight defendants sentenced under old guidelines that treated convictions for crack cocaine offenses more harshly than those involving the powder form of the drug. Critics blamed the disparity for longer sentences being handed to black convicts, and Obama changed the sentencing standards for future cases beginning in 2010.

"Ruemmler said the administration believes there is a larger pool of meritorious candidates for both pardons and commutations, and encouraged both types of applications. A pardon forgives a crime without erasing the conviction, typically after the sentence has been served. A commutation leaves the conviction and ends the punishment."